216 CHRISTIANITY IN CHINA, ETC. things; but they told me I was a liar. It is their custom to demand impudently and importunately what- ever they see ; and when we got free of them, we seemed to have escaped from real demons." From the time of their leaving Soldaya to their ar- rival at the camp of Sartak, a journey of two months, the monks never slept in a house, nor even under a tent, but always in the open air, or under their waggons. They never came to any villages, or buildings, but only to immense tumuli, filled with human bones. They stopped from time to time at Tartar encampments, where the attempts at extortion were always repeated, and presents demanded for the chief, so that the little store of wine and biscuit that our poor ambassadors had laid in, decreased with distressing rapidity. On reaching the camp of Scakatay, one of Sartak's officers, they found the Tartar seated on a divan, with his wife by his side, and a guitar in his hand ; " and I really thought," says Rubruk, " that his nose had been cut off, so flat was it, and that part of his face, as well as his eyebrows, were rubbed with a kind of black oint- ment, which was very frightful to look on." * The Tartars were as curious about news as they were eager for presents, and Scakatay never left off teasing Rubruk to know what was in the letters that he was taking to Sartak ; but the prudent diplomatist would only reply that the letters were sealed up, but that, doubtless, they contained only kind and amiable words. The Mongol then desired to know what they meant to say to Sartak when they should meet him, and on their replying that they had only to speak to him concerning
- Bergeron, p. 43.
